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Hydrology of Walnut Gulch, Arizona

Hydrology of Walnut Gulch, Arizona. Unearthing a First-Order Approximate Correlation Between Regional Hydrology and Extent of Vegetative Land Cover. Why Relate Hydrology and Vegetation?. Energy Transfer in an Ecosystem begins with Primary Producers Plants need Water…

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Hydrology of Walnut Gulch, Arizona

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  1. Hydrology of Walnut Gulch, Arizona Unearthing a First-Order Approximate Correlation Between Regional Hydrology and Extent of Vegetative Land Cover

  2. Why Relate Hydrology and Vegetation? • Energy Transfer in an Ecosystem begins with Primary Producers • Plants need Water… • Hydrologic Cycle dictates the sustainability of an Ecosystem

  3. Methodology • Select model ecosystem • Select easily quantifiable hydrologic variables • Construct an “Average Hydrologic Year” model • Quantify Vegetative Land Cover • Correlate the average hydrologic year with the vegetative land cover

  4. Model Ecosystem • Desert • RELATIVELY simple ecosystem • Most vegetation low shrub • Walnut Gulch is VERY well documented

  5. http://www.tucson.ars.ag.gov/dap/DAPveg/default.htm

  6. Hydrologic Variables • Precipitation • Easy to Measure • Easy to Average over watershed area • Atmospheric Moisture • Easy to Measure and Average over watershed • Soil Moisture • Difficult to Measure over any extent • Highly Heterogeneous over watershed area

  7. Annual Rainfall Data in 20-min Intervals

  8. Annual Daily Cumulative Rainfall

  9. 10-yr Average Rainfall Year

  10. Same Process for Atmospheric Moisture

  11. Quantifying Vegetative Cover • Fractional Absorbed Photosynthetically Active Radiation • faPAR = (PAR-rPAR)/PAR • rPAR = Reflected PAR PAR PAR rPAR rPAR

  12. 10-yr Average Daily Maximum faPAR

  13. Correlation with Precipitation

  14. Phase Shift

  15. Conclusions and Future Work • For desert environments, Vegetative Land Cover seems to be predicted by Precipitation • Is this true for other, more hydrologically complex ecosystems? • What causes the phase shift? • Deeper exploration of Soil Moisture and Watershed Storage

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